Do you ever listen in on conversations near you at the coffee shop? I do. And I hear some of the craziest things that way. A few days back, outside an airport coffee shop, I listened in as some black-coffee-drinking octogenarian, who was pissed off about getting one of those special SSSS "bend over and cough" searches, told his lady friend that "the world would be a much safer place if all the Jews disappeared overnight." She, not much better, laughed, and replied by saying "That wasn't a very Christian thing to say."
Wow. Now, I am not Jewish. I don't even have many Jewish friends (although two of my favorite friends are quite Jewish). I have never been to Israel and, to be honest, the story of the holocaust doesn't break my heart any more than any of the dozen or so shocking tales of genocide from the past century. But, wow. People really think that way? That is evil. Not only is that evil, it is also ignorant and stupid.
Strictly speaking, this bigot should limit his anger to the Israelis. Your average synagogue attendee in Brooklyn plays no great role in global political affairs. But he blames all of the Jews for the fact that we have to go through strict airport security and endure "Orange Alerts." In his mind, it is the fault of every living Jew that Muslim extremists want to kill Americans and Christians. But even if you believe his premise, his conclusion -- that the sudden passing of all living Jews would solve the problem -- is stupid, stupid, stupid.
Jews are everywhere on this planet. You can't just take up arms, commit genocide and be done with it. Weeding out the Jews without killing unintended non-Jewish victims would take something remarkable, even supernatural. So, what scenarios are feasible? I can think of just three:
(i) a nuclear war, asteroid or other disaster kills the entire human population.
That would do it. Of course, this option would be bad for the coffee shop geezer, too. If we all die, then we're all dead, aren't we? And isn't that worse than an orange alert?(ii) Y-hw-h sweeps all of the Jews to heaven, like Elijah.
And we, the unchosen, would be looking up and asking, "How come we got left behind?" I'm sure the geezer wouldn't like that either.(iii) Allah smites every last Jew on the Earth.
Yes, but if Allah does that, it's a safe bet that all other non-Muslims (e.g, Christian geezers in airport coffee shops) will soon join them.
So, "be careful what you wish for, you old fool." Yeah, that's what I should have said. But instead, I kept my mouth shut and just raised my eyebrows unevenly while glaring at the guy.
Let's hope he never finds a monkey's paw.
Comments